A Homey Atmosphere at Bob and Kay's

Couple runs old-fashioned dining counter at Rexall Drug in Vienna.

Although Margery and Steve Kraus don't visit often because they both work in downtown Washington, they enjoy grabbing a meal at Bob and Kay's Diner inside Vienna's Rexall Drug. If the Krauses are in Vienna running errands, they'll stop by.

"[It's] nostalgia, I guess. I grew up in a place like this," said Margery Kraus. "The food is good. It's personal."

Bob and Kay Price own and run the dining counter at Rexall Drug, which is located next to the Magruder's grocery store on Maple Avenue. They been serving both regulars and occasional customers like the Krauses for the past 24 years. The counter is open for breakfast and lunch on Monday through Saturday, and is closed on Sundays.

Through all that time, they have gotten to know the customers who come in regularly, greeting them with a cup of coffee.

"I love my customers," said Kay Price, as she was cooking an omelet. "And they've been coming here for years. And we've lost a few along the years. Old age, sick."

Kay Price and her husband took over the dining counter after she had been working for a few months with the woman who had previously owned it.

Since then, they have hired two waitresses, although the Prices still do a lot of the work. They don't usually take vacations, but when they do, they have a friend take over the counter when they're gone. They have also kept up with the times: although the cash register still looks traditional, Bob Price used a digital camera to take pictures of the menu items now strung across the wall.

The flow of business varies every day, although the weekly specials like the Seafood Day on Fridays "usually packs it in."

Being in the restaurant business is all they've ever done, Kay Price said, so she and her husband planned on staying for a long time.

"It's friendly, and it's homey," said Barbara Malanga of Vienna, who has been coming to Bob and Kay's several times a week ever since the Prices have owned it. "They have the best milkshakes ever. It's better than the ice cream parlor. And the hamburgers are good."